This invention relates to a fastening system for connecting a door support hinge to a cabinet wall. The invention has particular application for use with thin walled cabinets, i.e., cabinets having walls of no more than a half inch thickness at the location of hinge connection thereto.
For quite some time now, since at least the 1970""s, a system, called the 32 millimeter system, has been utilized in cabinet constructions. In the system holes are formed in cabinet walls which extend inwardly into the walls from the interior wall surfaces thereof. The holes are arrayed in spaced vertical rows which are 32 millimeters apart, center to center.
The reason for this precise placement is to facilitate installation of hardware such as mounting plates, drawer slides and the like by machinery. Fasteners associated with these parts are automatically located by the machines at the desired hole locations and installation completed. Essentially the machines are programmed with mathematical equations based on the 32 millimeter system to accomplish installation of the hardware with very little or in some cases even no labor being involved. Typically, 10 millimeter knock-in retention dowels are the fasteners employed.
It is conventional practice to install mounting plates of the 32 millimeter system with the mounting plates oriented vertically so that the dowel or dowels employed as fasteners are disposed in adjacent holes of only a single row. Unfortunately, this approach readily leads to structural failure of the cabinet wall when a force is applied to the cabinet door hinged to the mounting plates when the cabinet wall is thin, i.e., one half inch or less in thickness.
The present invention relates to structure which enables hinge mounting plates to be securely fastened in the holes of cabinets utilizing the 32 millimeter system, despite the fact that the cabinet is thin walled, i.e. one half inch in thickness or less. Utilizing the arrangement of the present invention, the cabinet wall may be subjected to relatively high loads caused by downward forces being exerted on the cabinet door without causing failure.
The combination of the invention includes a cabinet wall including an interior wall surface and having a plurality of holes formed therein extending inwardly into the cabinet wall from the interior wall surface. The holes are arrayed in a plurality of parallel, vertical rows, each vertical row separated a predetermined distance from adjacent vertical rows. The holes of each vertical row are spaced from one another.
A first hinge member is employed for attachment to a cabinet door.
A second hinge member is hingedly connected to the first hinge member. The second hinge member includes an elongated mounting plate having a cabinet wall engagement surface.
A plurality of fasteners are connected to the elongated mounting plate and extend from the cabinet wall engagement surface.
The elongated mounting plate extends horizontally between two adjacent vertical rows of holes formed in the cabinet wall with at least one of the fasteners located in a hole of one of said two adjacent vertical rows and at least one of the fasteners located in a hole of the other of said two adjacent vertical rows.
The fasteners are cooperable with the cabinet wall to resist pivoting of the second hinge member relative to the cabinet wall and failure of the cabinet wall at the hinge location when a downwardly directed force is applied to the first hinge member.